Tayhana Taylor, World News Editor
As the child of a public school teacher and an attorney, Judge Brown-Jackson’s love for practicing law came naturally. Jackson was born in Washington DC in 1970, she then moved with her parents to Miami at a young age.
Jackson believes that her passion for the law stems from her father, Johnny Brown. The two did homework side by side; for her father, it was reading cases for law school, and for her, it was coloring for pre-school.
When President Joe Biden announced Jackson as his supreme court justice nominee, he described her as “someone extremely qualified, with a brilliant legal mind, with the utmost character.”
Brilliance has always been a part of her character. She was selected as “mayor” of Palmetto Junior High because of her outstanding performance in debate and speech competitions. In her senior year at Miami Palmetto Senior High School, she became student body president.
After high school, she pursued her undergraduate degree at Harvard University. Jackson was disregarded by her high school guidance counselor when she mentioned her dream was to study law at Harvard. She ignored naysayers and persevered nonetheless.
She graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University in 1992 with Bachelor of Arts in government. Magna cum laude is an academic honor given to students in the top 10-15 percent of their class.
After completing her bachelor’s degree, she attended Harvard Law School where she earned her Juris Doctor degree in 1996. Jackson served as the supervising editor of the Harvard Law Review during her studies.
Graduating with honors was just a start for Jackson. After law school, she became a law clerk to Judge Patti B. Saris of the U.S. District Court for Massachusetts from 1996 to 1997. She also served as a law clerk for Judge Bruce M. Selya of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit from 1997 to 1998.
In 1998, Jackson took a break from being a law clerk and worked in private practice. She then went back to clerking, where she worked for Justice Stephen Breyer of the Supreme Court from 1999 to 2000.
Jackson worked in private law practice for another five years. She then she became a public defender in Washington DC from 2005 to 2007.
In 2009, President Obama nominated Judge Jackson to serve as the Vice-Chair of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, and she was confirmed with bipartisan support in 2010. Bipartisan support refers to two opposing political parties finding common ground to agree on an issue.
Two years after, she was nominated again to be a district court judge for the U.S. District Court. She was confirmed with bipartisan support in 2013.
Aside from being a judge, she is actively involved in her community. Jackson is a member of the Judicial Conference Committee on Defender Services and Harvard University’s Board of Overseers. She presently serves on the board of Georgetown Day School and the United States Supreme Court Fellows Commission.
If the Senate confirms Jackson, she will be the first supreme court justice who has been a public defender. She will also be the first African American woman to sit on the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land.
“African American women are underrepresented in federal and state courts, so if Judge Jackson gets confirmed, it will be historic,” said Frank Orlando, instructor of political science and director of Saint Leo University’s Polling Institute. “It is also very likely that she will get confirmed and sit on the court for a very long time.”
An African American woman being nominated did not come as a surprise to the American people.
“President Biden promised during his campaign that he was going to nominate an African American woman to the supreme court,” said Orlando. “Making this campaign pledge got him votes from African American women as they make up a large percentage of Democratic voters.”
Whether Biden’s nomination of Jackson was a political strategy or him being a good judge of character, Judge Jackson’s qualifications and experience speaks for itself.
